Davide Gentile and Marco Giuliani were childhood friends in Abruzzo, then lost touch. When they found each other again after university, it was with a shared passion for wine, so they decided to try their hands at making it together. Since the beginning of their project, they’ve approached it with a love of both natural winemaking and avid experimentation. They’ve never trained at a formal wine academy, and they don’t rely on agronomists or oenologists. They have learned by trial and error in the vineyards and cellars. In fact, their first fermentation in 2010 was such a disaster that they called in an expert grandma, virtuosa at getting rid of the evil eye, to perform a ritual over their grapes. Apparently it worked, and Lammidia (“evil eye” in Abruzzese dialect) was born.

Lammidia is a small-scale project, with Montepulciano, Trebbiano d’Abruzzo, Pinot Noir, and Barbera grown organically and biodynamically near the Adriatic coast. The winery is a converted farmhouse in a small village called Villa Celiera, about 700 meters above sea level in the hills of Pescara. Their non-interventionist attitude starts in the vineyard: no tilling, and all cut plant matter gets left behind to serve as mulch. In the cellar, they use only native yeast and don’t fine or filter.

Davide and Marco designed and built the concrete tanks and amphorae that they employ, with some steel and fiberglass containers in play, too. In their ten years of working together, they’ve produced about 60 labels, all imprinted with a picture of a hand and their motto: “uva e basta!” (grapes and that’s it)—no technology, no chemicals, no fancy tricks; just grapes and a few hands getting dirty in the soil.